The typical packaging for selling medicines, medicaments and/or prescriptions in the form of pills, tablets, capsules or the like (collectively, and hereinafter, “pill”), especially those used by a pharmacy, is an open-ended plastic cylindrical bottle or container with a separate cap for closing the opening. The cap is securable to the bottle via various attachment methods such as screw threads, interference or snap fit structures, as well as child-proof structures and the like. However, no matter what the style, the cap needs to be removed in order to retrieve or dispense the contents.
In recognition of this problem, U.S. Pat. No. 6,302,295 B1 to Weisman provides a replacement cap for a prescription pill container that allows dispensing of a single pill or capsule without removing the replacement cap. The replacement cap has a transparent hollow storage compartment at its top. The cap has a base that is configured to be received on a typical, child-proof configured top of the prescription pill container. The base includes an opening that is in communication with the interior of the pill container. The transparent lid forming the transparent hollow storage compartment is rotationally disposed on the base and includes an opening that can be selectively positioned over the base opening so as to allow a daily dosage (i.e. a single pill, tablet or capsule) to fall into the transparent lid. The lid may be further rotated to deregister the lid opening from the base opening thereby closing off the container compartment from the lid compartment. A second opening in the side of the transparent lid allows for dispensing the pill or capsule captured in the lid compartment from the lid. However, while the Weisman structure allows for the dispensing of a single pill, it has various shortcomings and/or drawbacks. For instance, the original cap to the prescription container must be replaced, which may be difficult or cumbersome to do. Moreover, in order to dispense a pill or capsule, the container must be turned upside down and shaken or otherwise manipulated in order to have a pill or capsule fall through the cap opening into the lid compartment, and then further manipulated to dispense the pill from the lid compartment through the lid opening.
Various other known pill dispensing containers have complex or complicated dispensing mechanisms for dispensing a single pill. For instance, in U.S. Patent Publication No. 2012/0006700 A1 by Geboers et al., there is provided a pill dispenser having a reservoir with a plurality of compartments, and a positioning disc having a plurality of exit orifices that is configured to dispense pills from the dispenser reservoir in a unit dose manner. This is accomplished by a guiding member that is rotatably arranged between the reservoir and the positioning disc, respectively connecting one compartment with one dedicated exit orifice in dispensing communication by accomplishing a rotary/rotational step.
Another example is U.S. Pat. No. 4,653,668 to Gibilisco et al., where a pill dispensing container that dispenses one pill at a time via a delivery mechanism having a funnel-shaped exit port and a delivery tube at the end of the exit port that is designed to accommodate no more than one pill. The funnel divides the outer receptacle into an upper storage compartment and a lower delivery compartment. A resilient gate member positioned between the exit port and the delivery tube prevents egress of a pill from the delivery tube without actuation of the container. Actuation of the container by pressing and twisting the end of the container allows a pill held by the gate member to be released thereby dispensing the pill from the container.
Other pill dispensing containers provide a plurality of individual compartments for holding a pill and a cover or housing that is configured to individually dispensing a pill. Examples of this type include U.S. Pat. No. 3,926,335 to Dangles et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 5,322,166 to Crowther. These devices however, like the above referenced devices, are cumbersome to use, generally inefficient and hard to manipulate by the typical medication user.
As discerned from the above, what is therefore needed is a less complicated pill dispensing container. What is further needed is a medicine dispensing container that is easy to manipulate in order to singularly dispense a pill. What is furthermore needed is a medicine dispensing container that is similar to existing pharmaceutical medicine dispensing containers. What is moreover needed is a medicine dispensing container that is simple in construction and manufacture. These and other needs are addressed by the present invention.